Oxford’s chancellor election has turned into a ridiculous spectacle
The habitual pomposity of the institution, paired with the university bureaucracy’s DEI crusade, has resulted in an election more cumbersome than the Tory leadership contest.
When Roy Jenkins was chosen to succeed Harold Macmillan as Chancellor of the University of Oxford in 1987, there were four candidates. When Chris Patten succeeded Jenkins in 2003 there were four candidates. This year, there are thirty eight candidates vying to replace Patten.
As a result, a cumbersome series of votes will now take place online. The first round will be by alternative vote in the week starting 28 October to whittle the long list down to five runners. There will be a second round starting 18 October, or the sixth week of the Michaelmas Term if you prefer. With the winner declared the following week. It is all taking longer than the Tory leadership contest since Patten announced his intention to go in February.
The habitual pomposity of the institution has melded with the university bureaucracy’s embrace of DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) and are to blame for the foolish international spectacle which Oxford is making of itself – much to the amusement of The New York Times, for example, with its headline “Zumba Teacher? Anti-Woke Cleric? 38 Candidates line up to Head Oxford”.
Recent leadership ructions have shown that American academia has little to be proud of. Oxford’s efforts to follow down the same path may go some way to explain why the University is dropping out of its habitual top placings in some league tables.
This leadership process is the second attempt by the university management to manipulate who is chosen as the Chancellor, who they grudgingly concede is “the Titular Head of the University”.
In March, they set up a self-appointed committee which would, “having due regard to the principles of equality and diversity and the approved role specification, determine which candidates are eligible”. After an outcry they backed off from what one government minister, Neil O’Brien, called “Eastern Bloc style managed democracy”.
As a grudging compromise they replaced the old system, whereby a candidate needed to be nominated by fifty Oxford graduates, with an open job advert and the innovation of voting online rather than in person, wearing an academic gown.
An explanatory note sent out to alumni by Richard Lofthouse of the “Oxford Public Affairs Directorate” drips with contempt for the old way of doing things. We are told that Roy Jenkins “stationed his minions with piles of gowns to lend out…the other winner in the contest was gown maker Castells of Oxford”. Meanwhile, “Archbishop Laud was possibly the most useful chancellor” – bad luck Oliver Cromwell, Lord Salisbury and the Duke of Wellington, to name but a few eminent statesmen who have done the job. And, of course, this year’s selection will reflect “the fundamental tolerance of Oxford in the face of the great storms of identity and meaning.”
Jenkins and Patten both savoured a good phrase. To Jenkins, the Chancellorship amounted to “impotence assuaged by magnificence”, to which Patten demurred it was “useful impotence”. The role demands a lot of ceremonial parading but it is really akin to being the non-executive chair of a public company – with influence rather than power over the Vice Chancellor, currently Irene Tracey, and her appointed team. To do that effectively, good judgement and reputational clout are required. The university bureaucrats seemed worried about a chancellor with the independence and stature to stand up to them.
They also fret about how it looks. This year, the 160th Chancellor is being chosen, starting in 1224 and in those six hundred years there hasn’t been a woman or, seemingly, a member of one of the UK’s ethnic minorities. What’s more, since 1717 every Chancellor has been a male politician.
History must take some of the blame. Women were not fully admitted to the University until 1920 – around the time they got the vote in this country. In previous centuries, graduates had to be planning to take holy orders.
The question facing Oxford is whether the pursuit of diversity should mean that the Chancellorship should be opened up to those who clearly do not merit the office. As one of the thirty eight applicants, physicist Dr Lyn Michelle Heimling sees it: “the request is, that I should explain why I am a suitable candidate. I shall reverse this and try to understand what would make me an unsuitable candidate. By what criteria would I be excluded?”
The doctor asks, “Is it just because I am not famous, not a politician, not a top businessman, not wealthy and have only been mentioned for good deeds in the local “Ruhr Nachrichten” newspaper, not splashed across the front pages of a national newspaper?” Well yes, sort of.
Like many of the less well-known applicants, she presents her life of quiet academic or business achievement as her qualification for the job. They are really challenging the criteria laid down for the Chancellorship. Their applications, bristling with self-importance and entitlement, should have been chucked out at this stage, instead of being kept on as inclusive window dressing.
Being schizophrenic, or Chinese, or speaking French and German or a Zumba teacher or “why not pick a rando?” are not relevant qualifications. Oxford has spelt out what it is seeking from its next chancellor: “Outstanding achievements in their field and the ability to command respect beyond it; a deep appreciation for the University’s research and academic mission, its global community, and its ambition to remain a world class research and teaching university; and the ability and willingness to enhance the reputation of the University locally, nationally and abroad.”
Applicants are not required to give their personal details, so as best as I can tell as many as eighteen candidates with minority backgrounds have applied and more than ten women. That is good news. But if they are all rejected, in favour of white men, the exercise could backfire, damaging Oxford’s desire for inclusivity.
It is a pity that Theresa May did not put her name forward, although she could hardly be blamed after there was a protest against hanging her picture in the Geography faculty where she studied. Oxford does not honour its most distinguished Tory women. Earlier, the Congregation, of academics, voted against a Doctorate for Margaret Thatcher, Britain’s first female prime minister and alumna of Somerville college.
Somerville’s principal Baroness Jan Royall and Lady Eilish Angiolini of St Hugh’s, respectively a Labour politician and Scottish lawyer have relevant backgrounds. But after years at the University there must be some question whether they can be “external figures of authority” holding the Oxford executive to account and arbitrating between factions.. Angiolini’s manifesto is “the status quo”.
Since both women work at the university, I am puzzled how they escape the ban on applicants who are “employees of the university”. But then again current members or candidates of legislative bodies are supposed to be ineligible as well. Perhaps all those members of the House of Lords are on leave of absence.
The University’s attempts to democratise the electorate have been met with partial success. Only about 10% of the 250,000 of “the Convocation”, the graduate alumni body, have registered and are eligible to vote. Perhaps enough to outplay the 8,000 strong Convocation of academics and others.
White male politicians may well end up dominating the final five. William Hague, Peter Mandelson, Dominic Grieve and David Willetts are all Oxford men in the running. Major General Alistair Bruce of Crionaich is a wildcard. Advisor on ceremonial to Downton Abbey and Sky News, he has a husband and went to Sandhurst.
It is odds on that the university bureaucracy’s DEI crusade will be frustrated. At least they and Patten have cut the Chancellor’s term of office from life to just ten years.
 | A guest post by
|